A blog about beer, food, cooking and good times...

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

What is an IBU? An IBU is a unit of measurement. International Bitterness Unit to be precise. Bitter Bob and Shorty each drank 102 of them last night. Each one of them was quite tasty. Hop Stoopid, brewed by Lagunitas Brewing Company (Petaluma, California, USA) is an incredible beer. Though we both had this beer after a hard day's work in the sun, we think it could be best enjoyed as a 10:30am weekend kickoff. At first sip, there is a ridiculous amount of hops assaulting every corner of your mouth. Grapefruit juice. Then comes the piney aftertaste. Piney aftertaste? Who wants that? Well, we do. (Grapefruit + Pine = Hops). To fess up, Shorty and I had both had this 8% ABV beer before, and until recently, it was the hoppiest beer ever. By far. But then this quest for the hoppiest beer began, and this beast has since been tamed; knocked down a few notches. That said, this beer is nothing short of incredible. Perfectly balanced (to a hop enthusiast) and to quote the Lagunitas website, "...our goal is to use as many different hops as we could...". That means hop complexity which may be the reason the entire mouth is pelted by bitter beauty. So, is this what a lot of IBUs tastes like? If so, we like it. We need to find more of it. The Hoppy Grail is near. We are on the path. Enlightenment...